Network-centric communications have increased dramatically in recent years across a wide variety of venues from military applications to commercial uses. The need to integrate multiple information sources into a usable format for operators and others who monitor these communications and events surrounding them is particularly important. A variety of communications devices are used by command and control (C2) operators. They allow operators to select radio frequencies to monitor or transmit information. However, the radio channels are usually mixed together into a single channel and presented monaurally, which often results in multiple channels overlapping and reducing the intelligibility of the messages. Another major disadvantage of current radio-based C2 communication devices is that the incoming radio messages are transient signals that are heard only once and are often missed, which can lead to requests for repeated information or, in some extreme cases, operational errors or accidents. The voice communications are generally not recorded, but in the few cases where they are C2 centers try to record transmissions with standard commercial off-the-shelf recording devices that cannot identify or distinguish different communication based on content or user. These systems can only record the combined communications stream, which deters analysis and interpretation. To facilitate access to the recorded information for later analysis, they must hand record times of critical events, then find that particular time period in the audio recordings after the mission is completed, and attempt to reconstruct transmissions from the combined communications. As a result, the communications are not readily available for analysis or action during the mission. This requires C2 operators to make detailed notes on paper, whiteboards, or other media, of the information that is transmitted over the radio to ensure accuracy in relaying the messages or building a real time picture of the environment. Time spent recording transmissions reduces the time operators have to analyze the information and perform other activities, and it limits their ability to monitor multiple channels, identify important events, and advise supervisors and others. These characteristics of existing communications media degrade, rather than improve, operators' performance and distract them from their primary roles and work.
As a result, text communications, often referred to as chat or text messaging, have proliferated in C2 and operations centers. Chat messaging can provide the ability to communicate rapidly with a widespread group of people. It also provides a fast, efficient way for multiple people to communicate with one another and C2 centers. Chat facilitates communications to multiple people without transmitting the same message on multiple radio channels or repeating information multiple times, and it creates a log of communications that operators can reference, saving time and reducing potential for errors. One major limitation of chat is the frequent incompatibility of different chat programs and the incompatibility of those programs with C2 communication systems and tactical displays. One alternative is adding additional displays to operators' limited workstation space. Even if workstations can accommodate these additions, operators must monitor additional displays and information and try to integrate chat information with other communications received over radio channels and other communications links. This arrangement does not promote efficiency or enable operators to leverage their time and expertise. Operators of these systems also face additional difficulties related to their inability to determine the communication workload of other users of the system. Operators who are engaged in verbal communications are sometimes able to judge the workload of the individuals they are communicating with based on vocal characteristics of stressed speech, but this is not a very reliable metric. Command and control operators are often connected to many different networks and they are simultaneously communicating with many different individuals on different networks or radio channels who are not visible or audible to one another. The means that overloaded operators are often the recipients of non-essential messages that could have been delayed or redirected to other operators if the message originators were aware of the current workload level of the recipients.
Successful resolution of these problems involves not only successful integration of multiple streams or channels of the same communications platform into an easy-to-use format, but also requires integration of different communications media into a single, integrated system that enables operators to monitor multiple, disparate communications channels and events, and arrange the different communications links and channels at their workstation in a way that allows them to monitor and coordinate disparate elements of one or more mission and events to provide supervisors, commanders, and others with access to timely, accurate information about those missions and events.